Had a summer that went by way too fast and an uncooperative computer! Boys are heading back to school next week and I’m hoping a new hard drive will solve my computer problems.

In the meantime, stay cool! I’m about ready to pour ice in my tub. Haha!

We’ve been having a busy month with our weekends beginning with this:

And Saturday mornings of this:

Leaving a little bit of time for this:

Our Spring Break was full of cleaning out bedrooms, sleeping in, going to San Diego Zoo, watching shows, and playing games.

Time off always goes too fast.

Last month I ended up having a huge problem with the yarn I purchased for the lace shawl I was excited to knit. It didn’t come in a ball and when I tried to wind it I ended up creating a ginormous KNOT! It took the better part of three weeks to untangle it, resulting in an accidental cut, causing me to give myself a face palm so loud you could hear it on the moon.

So once I successfully completed the ball, I had to take a break from the yarn drama. Haha

Enter an awesome chance to take a quilting class from a wonderful (understatement!) quilter of my ward! I’ve been enjoying quilting class every Thursday morning and have been working my best to finish a quilt I started about two years ago. (Sad proof)

I’m currently working on completing the sashing around the stars so I can lay out my blocks and arrange them together! It’s so fun and it’s been a really good experience for me to get to go out once a week and work on a project. Making myself leave the house forces me to work on the quilt instead of finding reasons to put it off. I’m hoping to have my quilt top completed in time for next week’s class!

THEN I’ll pick up the needles and cast on! 😉

photo by Brittany Wood

Today is my Birthday and I’m finally NINE!! I plan to have a nice day with some of my favorite people!

Happy Leap Day to all!!!

This past weekend, Mr. O and I had some fun making Valentine’s for his class party today. This year he wanted to pass out Sour Punch Straws. We added a pencil from the Target Dollar Spot and a cute Valentine sling shot guy we found at Michael’s to mix it up a bit. 😉

I’ve been on a Silhouette kick lately, so I browsed the 3D box selections and found one that would hold up to 8 pencils – perfect for Sour Punch Straws! The box was so easy to put together and it was a nice change from Valentines of the past where I decorated little bags of goodies.

I’ve been hoarding this paper ever since I did a Christmas card class years ago. I don’t know if they even make this pattern anymore, but it’s such a cute print and I love the option of colors. My favorite part of the Valentine is Owen’s cute writing – even though he hated writing out 28 (the fun ended at about six!).

Then with about 15 minutes before leaving for school, we whipped up his Valentine bag using our favorite bold black letter stickers! He was happy to tote his goodies to school and ready for their Valentine breakfast!

On one more fun note, today my Mom is having a Twilight party at work (wish I could be there!) so I made these cupcakes for her to take in! They turned out pretty yummy!

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Yesterday I had a happy mail day when the yarn I ordered for my lace shawl finally arrived!

It is so soft! I spent a good 5 minutes rubbing it on my cheek. Then I rubbed in on the boys’ faces. Then back on mine. LOL!

This particular color is named Bluebeard and I purchased it from this etsy store: pigeonroofstudios

I plan on using it for this shawl: Skywalker

My Mom got me a couple of online knitting classes thru Craftsy for Christmas and I’m excited to start one of the projects! I’m impressed with the classes so far. I’ve already watched them thru once so now I’m reading to start one of the lessons! Knitting lace will be another skill I’m adding to my knitting knowledge … I hope it goes good!

Wish me luck! 😉

Last night I finished the first of my goals for this year! I decided that 2012 was going to be the year I complete projects and minimize my craft spending. I have many incomplete projects that have been cast aside for one reason or another and I have finally decided to either complete them or get rid of them!

One “goal” I’ve had for several years is to have all our Christmas stockings completed. (It’s kind of a joke considering it’s Don who is the one that’s really excited for the stockings, making the task of completing them kind of forced. *wonk*) In the old house we didn’t have a mantel so I let myself slack and not give the projects any urgency, but now we have two mantels so have no more excuses! I posted a couple of years ago about completing Don’s stocking. Well, this past December I finally attached the back to the front as part of his Birthday presents and hung it with our stockings. (oops!) That’s when I decided that I’m just going to plow thru the remaining three so we can get rid of the tacky puffy painted stockings for 2012!

I might have lost some eyesight, but it sure feels good to now have two stockings completed! I decided to map out my year, project wise, and set myself a goal of completing at least one project each month. Hopefully this will keep me from going crazy and feeling like I have bitten off more than I can chew. I’m also hoping this will accelerate my project completion since I’ll be letting myself focus on one project at a time, instead of having my trade-mark one million projects at once going on! 😉

January’s goal was to complete Perrin’s stocking and I got it done with two days to spare! Very impressed with my procrastinating self! My next goal is to complete a lace shawl and I am giving myself the month of February to complete it, after which I will return to Christmas stockings in March to complete Owen’s.

One more happy customer!

Goose has a small mouth. So when he lost his top tooth last month, it started pushing his baby tooth to the side. “Make way for the big tooth!” it said!

As it pushed the baby tooth aside, it caused the baby tooth to rotate so that it is now at a diagonal, giving Goose his Vampire Tooth.

Goose has since been telling everyone, even his school Principal, that he has a Vampire Tooth. Most adults don’t know how to take this news and give him a distant, “that’s nice” as Don and I laugh at their puzzled faces. He then runs away, proud of his Vampire Tooth.

This is Scraggy. He doesn’t have a Vampire Tooth but I was told he wanted his picture taken.

Today is our 15th Wedding Anniversary!

I think that’s crazy! Mostly because I can’t believe it’s already been 15 years, but I’m also in denial at having an 11-year-old boy!

The time has gone by too fast.

These past 15 years have been quite the adventure and I’m looking forward to an even more adventurous next 15 years!

<3

Hello! Been busy enjoying the holiday season. I have been having a lot of fun decorating the home for Christmas, which I’ll share later, and getting ready for when the boys have winter break.

In November we got our family pictures done and I’m having the hardest time deciding on which ones to send out, blow up for our home, and use for school photos! They are all so wonderful!

We had the pleasure to get our photos taken by Brittany Wood this year! (She’s my Sister-in-Law’s sister and currently down in So Cal, which I was excited about!) We had such a great experience with her taking our family pictures! It was a lot of fun sharing ideas I had for photo stylings and having her give us directions for other photos taken along the hiking trail.

If you’re in the So Cal area and looking to get family photos done, I highly recommend contacting Brittany! She’s also great with younger kids and babies – which can be understandably tricky at times.

If you’re not in the So Cal area, check out her blog and website for photo inspirations! She also has a FB page for her photography where you can view her latest sessions! I love searching thru photography sessions for inspiration on what to wear and what fun props to use for my photos. Then when you’re ready to be wowed, check her etsy store! She does portraits that are amazing!

I hope they never move away so she can do my pictures every year! LOL!!!